Shipping container Inflation! (700%)

[jh9]

My employer is expecting more work from me because of labor issues and people out sick. They want me to work even harder - while doing nothing to compensate. Surrounding employers (municipality) pay better and offer opportunity to advance. Our municipality like many private employers isn't doing much to incentivize work. People need to work hard to earn money. Granted. But for a long time the ball has belonged to the employer and they've made the demands. I think that they maybe don't grasp that treating your workers like a resource and not people is coming to roost. With big chains offering more and more for less skilled labor it makes it easy to walk away from bad employers.

...

The result is skilled labor looking to take easier jobs that will make them the same, or in many cases better pay.

That's true. Nobody wants to hear it but it's true. Everybody wants to bring out the lazy strawman who doesn't want to work but the reality is that the people who actually work for a living have leverage now, and they're using that to work at places that benefit them. That it might not benefit The Economy as a whole isn't their concern nor should it be.

Employers are mad because now they don't hold all the cards anymore. I think it's a good thing TBH. The unspoken notion that we have an entire class of sacrificial Morlocks who are supposed to grind themselves into dust creating an infinite novelty machine so the Eloi can get cheap imported shit from Amazon every 2 days is a problem, not a solution. If someone is going to bust their ass for 60 hours a week to enable the widget pipeline that drives the economy then maybe they should be paid commiserate to the value they create. And if this company won't, another one will.

[blues]

That's true. Nobody wants to hear it but it's true. Everybody wants to bring out the lazy strawman who doesn't want to work but the reality is that the people who actually work for a living have leverage now, and they're using that to work at places that benefit them. That it might not benefit The Economy as a whole isn't their concern nor should it be.

Employers are mad because now they don't hold all the cards anymore. I think it's a good thing TBH. The unspoken notion that we have an entire class of sacrificial Morlocks who are supposed to grind themselves into dust creating an infinite novelty machine so the Eloi can get cheap imported shit from Amazon every 2 days is a problem, not a solution. If someone is going to bust their ass for 60 hours a week to enable the widget pipeline that drives the economy then maybe they should be paid commiserate to the value they create. And if this company won't, another one will.

Fine. They don't have to take a job they don't want...but the taxpayers shouldn't be paying for them to stay home and leverage the marketplace.

You can look for another job while you're working. It's not my job to feed and clothe you while you sit around the shack if there are jobs you are capable of doing.

[Cory]

Fine. They don't have to take a job they don't want...but the taxpayers shouldn't be paying for them to stay home and leverage the marketplace.

You can look for another job while you're working. It's not my job to feed and clothe you while you sit around the shack if there are jobs you are capable of doing.

I agree. But, I don't think thats happening. If you don't go to work right now, you don't get paid. That hasn't changed. It's easy to blame people being lazy and not working for the labor problems, but it doesn't make it true. Those not making much money still have to pay bills. The money has to come from somewhere and they're going to work to pay it. People are moving to less strenuous or less stressful careerfeilds because the balance doesn't work in their favor anymore.

That's my pure opinion, and I could be wrong. I'm not weeping about the labor issues though.

[jh9]

Fine. They don't have to take a job they don't want...but the taxpayers shouldn't be paying for them to stay home and leverage the marketplace.

You can look for another job while you're working. It's not my job to feed and clothe you while you sit around the shack if there are jobs you are capable of doing.

You, specifically, aren't paying for anyone so they can sit around the shack.

As mentioned earlier the gravy train of federal covid money expired weeks ago.

People pay into Unemployment Insurance while they're working. Anyone "on unemployment" is taking advantage of a system they funded while working. It's also generally a state-level program so outside NC you wouldn't even be paying for anyone anyway.

[blues]

I'm no expert Cory, I'm not trying to explain macro or microeconomics...it's beyond my lane by a wide swath. I was merely expressing my position vis-a-vis benefits vs. work, whether it is current reality or not. This way I don't have to argue one side or another.

When I graduated from university in 1974...my B.S. degree was worth pretty much that. I went to an untold number of interviews with companies and employment agencies and they looked at me like "what makes you think you deserve a job?" Went nowhere.

So, I drove a taxi for a while...put up a sign in the taxi that I was looking for more meaningful employment. Got an offer from the boss of an air freight company at JFK. Took that, was thankful, but didn't like it. Left to be a salesman at Abercrombie & Fitch. That was fun for a year and a half and then they went Chapter 11.

Took a couple of crap jobs, one was a boiler room op on Wall St. that could only have been marginally legal...and finally got my foot in the door with the government sometime after that. Starting pay in 1977 was $9959 based upon my qualifications under the "outstanding scholar" provision. Almost $200 a week seemed okay for a single guy at 25 so...I spent the next 27 years with uncle and never looked back.

My pay went up more than tenfold in that time...and I've never complained about being underpaid, my pension, or taking three voluntary downgrades to get the positions, classification and locations I was seeking.

And now, I'm here to bust balls with those unwilling to do the same.

You're one of the good guys, Cory, so you should always know that it doesn't matter if you agree with me or not. You've earned my respect and friendship.

[blues]

You, specifically, aren't paying for anyone so they can sit around the shack.

As mentioned earlier the gravy train of federal covid money expired weeks ago.

People pay into Unemployment Insurance while they're working. Anyone "on unemployment" is taking advantage of a system they funded while working. It's also generally a state-level program so outside NC you wouldn't even be paying for anyone anyway.

I'm more familiar (personally) with the unemployment system than you know. I know how it works and what funds it. In various states.

[HCM]

Anyone have insight on these claims ?

Hat tip to William Monie Bauer for the following information:
“Essentially the trains and ports have formed an old fashion trust (as is Sugar trust, steel trust, oil trust, etc). They are all engaging in anticompetitive, monopolization behavior.

This has driven the costs astronomically higher from $2000 per container (TEU) to $20,000 per TEU to ship out of US Pacific Coast ports before rail costs are considered. All involved (ports and railroads) are profiting beyond belief at the expense of especially small and medium size businesses in the US.

Currently, the leftist cabal that controls CP, CN, BNSF, and soon KS, are engaged slowdown along with US west Coast ports. UP, if it is not in on the game, is swamped and beyond capacity.

None of these entities are hiring for these highly desired and well compensated jobs, yet they claim a labor shortage.
The key to this supply chain crisis (now termed portageddon) is the dwell times at the ports, the second key is the lack of available train slots to move goods.

I have brought this up with Democrats at all levels of the governments involved. Most, are too stupid, and too oblivious, to understand why this is important.

The smarter ones are carefully avoiding the subject.

None are willing to use the Sherman antitrust act.

As I have pointed out, key Democrat money men are behind this trust, including Warren Buffet (BNSF) and Bill Gates(CN) through their very fortuitously timed railroad investments (There are several others - all Democrats). Originally this started as an oil play, using left wing activist groups to shut down pipelines, and fracking in pipeline adjacent US oil fields, in order to drive oil onto rails from the Canadian Tar sands. This caused rails and trains to become extremely devoted to oil transport earning them between $10-30/barrel mostly $30) margins on a 700 barrel tanker cars which squeezed the lower cost margin containers ($2.12 mile average long haul cost) out of priority.
As a result, shippers started bidding on ever diminishing container slots, and those slots have become radically more expensive (again to around $20/long mile), all benefiting the bottom line of railroads.

Truckers have become in short supply because businesses have found it much cheaper to truck shipments and pay truckers very well to do long haul shipping rather than to use either rails or ships to US West Coast ports. This, as this article points out, has now collapsed the availability of short haul truckers to move containers to and from the ports.

Now with the squeeze on container shipping these costs have exploded ($20,000 per TEU to transport across the oceans, and either off load or onload at a US West Coast port, along with another $20,000 to ship to the port by rail = $40,000 per TEU total cost)
It is so bad, I know of businesses in Seattle paying long haul trucker to take containers to (Republican controlled) ports thousands of miles across country to get their product shipped abroad.

A left wing environmentalist who is honest, (ROFLMAO), would realize the huge carbon footprints this cascading crisis has caused as everything is being shipped by truck to South East US ports rather than boat or train from Pacific ports

But to acknowledge this would point a finger at Biden's disastrous decision to end stop all oil development on US public lands, ending the Keystone XL pipeline permanently, along with Trudeau's decision to end similar pipelines in Canada.

Elections have consequences.
Vastly higher carbon footprints, exploding shipping costs, closing small businesses (not to mention businesses never opened), and a collapsing North American supply chain is just a few.

The virtue signaling leftist voters have spoken. They want increased carbon footprints rather than tweets from the Orange man (who drove down America's carbon footprint), the want "Equity" in unemployment rather than any jobs in the US, they want oil on rail cars exploding in our towns and cities rather than on much safer pipelines, they want their super wealthy donors to become even wealthier while small and medium businesses are closed or never started as a result of their policies.

What the leftists wants and have voted for is a third world country, with hugely connected and fabulously wealthy oligarchs on top and everyone else poor and struggling at the bottom.

The US has now gotten what they voted for.....”

[TGS]

I agree. But, I don't think thats happening. If you don't go to work right now, you don't get paid. That hasn't changed. It's easy to blame people being lazy and not working for the labor problems, but it doesn't make it true. Those not making much money still have to pay bills. The money has to come from somewhere and they're going to work to pay it. People are moving to less strenuous or less stressful careerfeilds because the balance doesn't work in their favor anymore.

That's my pure opinion, and I could be wrong. I'm not weeping about the labor issues though.

How are there openings in the better paying and/or less stressful/strenuous jobs for them to migrate to?

[Cory]

How are there openings in the better paying and/or less stressful/strenuous jobs for them to migrate to?

Anyone can flip a burger, and the pay is beginning to rival some skilled jobs. Where did those original burger flippers go? That I don't know. Perhaps they looked for education. Perhaps they're lazy, young, kids who live with Mom and Dad. I honestly don't know.

[TGS]

When I graduated from university in 1974...my B.S. degree was worth pretty much that. I went to an untold number of interviews with companies and employment agencies and they looked at me like "what makes you think you deserve a job?" Went nowhere.

So, I drove a taxi for a while...put up a sign in the taxi that I was looking for more meaningful employment. Got an offer from the boss of an air freight company at JFK. Took that, was thankful, but didn't like it. Left to be a salesman at Abercrombie & Fitch. That was fun for a year and a half and then they went Chapter 11.

Took a couple of crap jobs, one was a boiler room op on Wall St. that could only have been marginally legal...and finally got my foot in the door with the government sometime after that. Starting pay in 1977 was $9959 based upon my qualifications under the "outstanding scholar" provision. Almost $200 a week seemed okay for a single guy at 25 so...I spent the next 27 years with uncle and never looked back.

My pay went up more than tenfold in that time...and I've never complained about being underpaid, my pension, or taking three voluntary downgrades to get the positions, classification and locations I was seeking.

And now, I'm here to bust balls with those unwilling to do the same.

I'm honestly not sure what sort of point you're trying to drive home. You seem a little touchy about the subject, but I figured I'd dive in anyway.

Your story isn't unique against today's 25 y/o trying to migrate their way through the workplace and scratching out some semblance of a career path which is a fleeting concept in today's marketplace for most people outside the public sector. Your starting salary in 1977 is equivalent to almost $44k today when correcting for inflation, so yeah it certainly wasn't bad at all given your lack of professional work experience. I started my current job at $46k/year before LEAP kicked in (we used to not get it during FLETC, which has since changed), and that was as a 30 y/o who served 4 years in the Marines as a commissioned officer, worked urban EMS and had some graduate education.....not someone that participated in a scam ring and drove a cab with Travis Bickle on graves.

I thank my lucky stars for how fortunate I am that my efforts have paid off, but for every "me" that my agency hires there's literally 99.3 other people who like me were qualified for the job but who are still on the cliff's edge, clawing and scratching to "get somewhere". What you just spelled out as your experience? I'm not saying this to be a dick, just trying to be frank and address what I see as an elephant in the room: you'd be a very low-ranked candidate in today's market and likely be one of the millennials who has a college degree with virtually no realistic way of ever paying it off or owning a house. I know people who are twice as accomplished as you were in 1977 applying to that job and yet they can barely even get interviews today. Specific to our profession, if we planted someone with your resume circa-1977 into the lobby of current day candidates waiting for their interviews at a random 1811 job, the interviewers would probably think their buddy from HR who compiled the candidates was either drunk or playing a joke.

Again, I'm not writing that to be a dick, but we should view things through a lens relative to the current day. The more I read your story, the more I think you probably had it easier than the average job candidate today....not harder.